Balloon

BALLOON VERSION 1.2 July 25, 1990 Federico Atristain IBM Westlake ii BALLOON ABSTRACT ________ Balloon is one of many utilities that help the programmer/tester to create scenarios in the computer to test the programs he/she has developed. This specific package is composed of two pieces. Balloon Script (this file) which has the documentation and also Balloon Exebin which is the program in itself. This program is useful to create different scenarios where the user needs to restrict the amount of disk space. This is obtained by creating a "balloon" file which can be "inflated" to any size (depending on the disk space). I want to recognize the encouragement to create this particular tool that was given by two friends, Dan Butterfield who does every thing simple in his machine and Emmett Beam whose imagination has no limit. Also many thanks to Al Heath who's counsel made possible the speeding up of the program. I hope that although this is the first tool made (a very simple one) it will not be the last one and it will encourage others to pursue to make computers simple by computers. Abstract iii iv BALLOON CONTENTS ________ THE BALLOON PROGRAM 1 Invoking BALLOON 1 THE BALLOON PROGRAM PARAMETERS 3 Different Parameters for different cases 3 MESSAGES FROM BALLOON 7 Syntax 7 Meanings of the messages 7 POSSIBLE ENHANCEMENTS 9 CHANGE HISTORY 11 Contents v vi BALLOON THE BALLOON PROGRAM ___________________ The BALLOON program will create a file named BALLOON.FLE in the "ROOT" direc- tory of the drive and of the size specified by the user. INVOKING BALLOON To invoke the BALLOON program to work for you type: BALLOON x: SIZE=yyyyyyyyy or BALLOON x: LEAVE=yyyyyyyyy or BALLOON x: ? or BALLOON ? or BALLOON BALLOON can run either in an OS/2 session or in the DOS compatibility box or in a simple DOS machine. The BALLOON Program 1 2 BALLOON THE BALLOON PROGRAM PARAMETERS ______________________________ The BALLOON program parameters are very simple and self-explanatory. In case that they are forgotten, to invoke BALLOON with a "?" or just BALLOON will cause the program to display the different ways of invoking it and also the meaning of the parameters in itself. DIFFERENT PARAMETERS FOR DIFFERENT CASES The parameters which are used to invoke BALLOON will define the case to which the user is referring to. It is important to remember how BALLOON works since it has different usages. The different cases that BALLOON has are as follows: 1. The SIZE case. This case is to specified to BALLOON to create a file of "size" bytes in the root directory of the drive specified. Note that it is an Operating System restriction to have files in "allocation size" byte blocks there- fore the file size will be rounded UP to the nearest "allocation size" bytes block. The "allocation size" depends on the unit where the BALLOON file needs to be created. For a hard disk can be 2048 bytes but for a diskette it can be 512 bytes. This allocation size is the minimum size a drive needs to allocate for a file smaller than the allocation size. (i.e. For a 1 (one) byte file to be created in a hard disk with an allocation unit of 2048 bytes the hard disk will reserve 2048 bytes of space and in it will create a 1 byte file. The DOS dir command will show 2048 bytes less left in the drive although it will show an only 1 (one) byte file created). So therefor if allocation size is 2048 bytes then BALLOON will work as follows for the different size files: SIZE=1 byte Result will be a 2048 bytes file, SIZE=2048 bytes Result will be a 2048 bytes file, SIZE=2049 bytes Result will be a 4096 bytes file, etc. 2. The LEAVE case. Here LEAVE specifies to BALLOON to "leave" certain space in the drive specified. Note that in this case it will be rounded UP also. (i.e. LEAVE=1 byte Result will be a 2048 bytes disk space left, LEAVE=2048 bytes Result will be a 2048 bytes disk space left, LEAVE=2049 bytes Result will be a 4096 bytes disk space left, etc. for a unit with a 2048 bytes allocation size) The BALLOON Program Parameters 3 3. The ? case. This case requests for BALLOON to tell you if there is a BALLOON.FLE file in the root directory of the drive, the size of it and the amount of space left in that drive. 4. The NO drive cases. This is to allow BALLOON to inform you of its parameters and their usage. This was considered important because no one remembers all the parameter of the different tools all the time. THE SIZE CASE: To invoke this case just specify the following: BALLOON x: SIZE=yyyyyyyyy Where x: is the drive to be used (it can be a diskette drive) and yyyyyyyyy is the size of the balloon file to be created. NOTE that BALLOON will round up the size for you to the next "allocation size" bytes block. Also numbers greater that 999,999,999 are not allowed. Do not use commas. And 0 (zero) for a BALLOON file size is not valid. THE LEAVE CASE: To invoke this case you will need to specify the following: BALLOON x: LEAVE=yyyyyyyyy Where x: is the drive to be used (it can be a diskette drive) and yyyyyyyyy is the amount of space that you want BALLOON to leave in you drive. NOTE that BALLOON will round up the amount of space that you want to leave in your drive to the next "allocation size" bytes blocks. Also numbers greater than 999,999,999 are not allowed. Do not use commas. Zero for a LEAVE parameter will mean fill the disk up. The : is needed for the drive. THE ? CASE: This case is only an informative case. To use this case specify: BALLOON x: ? Where x: is the drive to be used (it can be a diskette drive) and ? tells BALLOON to show you the size of BALLOON.FLE if any, and the disk space before and after BALLOON.FLE was created NOTE that no other parameter is needed for this case. THE NO DRIVE CASES: The purpose of this cases are to allow the user to have a handy quick reference to BALLOON To use this case just type: BALLOON ? or 4 BALLOON BALLOON The BALLOON Program Parameters 5 6 BALLOON MESSAGES FROM BALLOON _____________________ All of BALLOON messages are very simple. Note that BALLOON expects certain syntax to be invoked. SYNTAX The required syntax is as follows: o The word "SIZE" or "LEAVE" (upper, lower or mixed case is OK) o The "=" sign following the word and before the number with no spaces in between. o The number without commas in it. o No zero for file size. o No implicit zero for Leave statement (i.e. specified for BALLOON to leave the total amount of disk space left in the drive. This means to try to create a 0 (zero) bytes BALLOON file. MEANINGS OF THE MESSAGES BALLOON file of zzzzzzzzz bytes already exist in drive n: You have specified a balloon file size to be created but one of that same amount already exist in the root directory of the drive that you specified. Disk space left in n: drive is already zzzzzzzzz bytes You have requested for BALLOON to leave an amount of space that is the same as the one existing . BALLOON file is not present on drive n: You have inquire for the status of the BALLOON file in a drive that does not have a BALLOON file in the ROOT directory. BALLOON file requested is too big for drive n: You have requested for BALLOON to create a file bigger than the disk space left in your drive. Disk space requested to be left is greater than the available on drive n: You have specified to leave more space than the one that your drive has. Drive n: is not a valid drive in your configuration You specified a drive that is not available in your machine. You Messages from BALLOON 7 can only specify either a hard disk or a diskette unit for BALLOON to work properly. 8 BALLOON POSSIBLE ENHANCEMENTS _____________________ The enhancements will depend on the amount of time that I may have left after work and the input of the interested users. Some possibilities are: o A "Pop" option for BALLOON to locate and erase the BALLOON.FLE o Allow commas in the number for SIZE or LEAVE o Handling Ctrl-C when interrupting BALLOON to include a message for Canceling confirmation o Work exact in HPFS drives. Possible enhancements 9 10 BALLOON CHANGE HISTORY ______________ Version 1.0 The initial creation of BALLOON 6/1990 Version 1.1 Fix when size to leave is greater than disk space 8/1990 Version 1.2 Speed up BALLOON in the file creation and make it windowable 11/1990 Change History 11